I liked this book.
I was getting tired of Sookie's whining. Then came sexy Quinn and the descriptions got very interesting. But most of all I liked the fact that we are getting more and more into the supes' world. We now know that Sookie is a fairy (and I guess that that is one of the reasons why she has a fairy godmother) and that is her fairy book that keeps attracting all the supes around her. We also learn a thing or two about Bill and Eric.

My least favourite part was the fact that we follow the story through Sookie's eyes, but when the finally figures who her attackers are and were her cousin hid the bracelet we have to wait for her to tell someone! I spent the book listening to the thinking that this guy is hot or that she is tired of being hurt and all that garbage, but then she has the Eureka moment, we hear her say that she figured it out, then the chapter jumps to the action and we don't know how she figured it out. And then the same with the whole bracelet incident.

But all in all was a good book. Fast read... ( )

Well things have gotten interesting for sure ( )

With the death of her vampire cousin Hadley, Sookie has inherited her estate, ie, the contents of her apartment in New Orleans. The apartment seems to be the focus of a series of break-ins. Something is going on. Sookie also is being pressured by Eric and the Vampire Queen to make her telepathy at their disposal for a major conference. And the Pelt family is still trying to hassle her about the death of their daughter. On the positive side Quinn comes back into her life and she starts to date the were-tiger. Lots of secrets and supernatural politics as usual and plenty of action. Good addition to the series. ( )

I can't stay away from these Sookie Stackhouse books. Luckily, you can get thru each one in a day or two. ( )

In this sixth volume of the series, some major developments occur. However, contrary to the blurb the book is not all about Sookie's visit to New Orleans, ostensibly to deal with the affairs of her cousin Hadley, who had become a vampire and been murdered by another vampire, six weeks before the current story opens. In fact, it isn't until page 150 that she is finally in a car heading there.

The first part of the story is pretty slow. It deals mainly with various 'domestic' issues such as Jason's love life, and his status as a "bitten" shapeshifter, and some changes in the line up of men who have been queuing to jump into bed with Sookie. A couple of her suitors drop out of the running when she accepts the fact that she could never bear to live in the inbred and remote community led by Calvin Norris, and she falls out with another man who was formerly a front runner. I did find her reaction to finding out that Calvin had fathered three children by different women - his duty as pack leader, since the birth rate is low in his community - rather extreme when she says she was profoundly glad she had never considered marrying him because she would have thrown up, during the conversation when they finally come to the end of the road in their potential relationship. I appreciate that she might have felt uncomfortable around the various women and their children, but this seems another symptom of the mentality which made her seethe with rage and jealousy when Bill brought his new date into the bar where Sookie works - despite the fact that he had been her abuser by most people's standards.

The impending visit to New Orleans is introduced early on in a weird revelation about Sookie's cousin Hadley, her vampire nature and her relationship with the vampire Queen of Louisiana. It seems that the vampire who killed Hadley has already been executed, and that this was carried out with Sookie as a witness, according to some vampiric ceremony. I hasten to say this is not a spoiler because Sookie feeds this to the reader as an infodump on page 13. I thought I must have missed out a volume. But no, I had read the book immediately preceding this one, which contains no mention of Hadley. I vaguely recall that a daughter of her aunt was mentioned in book 1 of the series, as someone who had gone off the rails, possibly through drug addiction, and had not been in touch even when her mother had died so could have been dead. It seems all along that she had instead become a vampire. But it is a weird authorial choice to tackle all that in a few paragraphs, as it seems sufficient material for a whole book, given that Hadley had been off the radar for years.

Sookie's new relationship with were tiger Quinn is the big romance of this volume. I did wonder if there was a continuity error when Sam reacted to Quinn's appearance at the bar - Sookie stated that she hadn't told him of Quinn's involvement (as an event organiser) in the leadership contest among the Shreveport weres at the end of the previous volume - since I did remember Sam's reaction to smelling a tiger's scent on Sookie in that story. I went back to check and it wasn't such an error as I thought, as he hadn't at the time realised the tiger was Quinn and she hadn't told him, but as he knows who Quinn is in this volume and can surely smell that he is a were tiger, it's odd that we don't see the "penny drop" from Sam's reaction.

As if there aren't enough supernatural elements in this series already, more are introduced in this volume: demons and semi-demons. Also, the fairy character Claudine mentions that she is attempting to become an angel, and it seems demons, fairies and angels are on some kind of sliding scale. Claudine acts again as fairy godmother, and a later revelation perhaps explains why she takes so much of an interest in Sookie. She does explain why she hasn't been able to turn up every time Sookie is in trouble, so the author obviously realised that needed to be covered.

More minor characters are introduced, but at least the witch Amelia is an appealing character and it seems might become a friend for Sookie. One thing that should be mentioned is that the book needs a trigger warning for a scene in the second half involving assault at the hands of one of a band of abductors.

As previously, the author describes scenes of action well, such as those set in the swamps, or the climactic battle. But the book drags in all the places where the setting is scenes of domesticity, people chatting about forthcoming marriages etc.

A huge revelation occurs in the New Orleans section of the book, which rocks Sookie to the core and leads to some rather reckless behaviour. Despite the other character's attempts to make amends late on, it seemed like classic abuser behaviour to me so I was pleased that Sookie did not fall for it.

The New Orleans setting was, I felt, rather wasted. Apart from a sequence set in swamps outside the city, there wasn't really anything evoked of the area or that couldn't have happened in any normal town.

All in all, a rather mixed bag so on balance it comes out at a 3 star rating ( )